Education:

MPhil, Modern Irish History, Trinity College, Dublin
MA, English Literature and History, University of Edinburgh

 
Research Interests:

20th century Irish-America; the Irish Diaspora and Catholicism; U.S. immigration, ethnicity, and race

 
Awards and Fellowships

• University Dissertation Fellowship, Boston College, 2011-2012
• Littleton-Griswold Research Grant, American Historical Association, June 2011
• Research Travel Grant, Cushwa Center, University of Notre Dame, 2011
• Dorothy Mohler Research Grant, American Catholic History Research Center, Catholic University of America, 2011
• Donald J. White Teaching Excellence Award, B.C. May, 2010
• Summer Research Stipend, Clough Center for Constitutional Studies, Boston College. Summer, 2010
• Irish Studies Fellowship, Boston College
• Irish Fulbright Commission Award in Humanities 2007/08
• Janet S. Christie Award, University of Edinburgh, 2005

 
Conference Presentations:

• “Migration and the Natural Law: American Catholic Thought, Pius XII, and the Immigration Question in the Post-war Era,” Biennial Boston College Conference on the History of Religion, Chestnut Hill, MA, March 30-31, 2012. (Panel co-Organizer.)
• “‘Not Foreigners, Yet Foreign’: Puerto Rican Immigrants and the American Catholic Press, 1946-1960,” American Political History Graduate Conference, Boston University, Boston, MA, March 24-25, 2012.
•  “The More Favorable Distribution of Men on the Earth’s Surface”: Papal Doctrine, Catholic Thought, and the Immigration Debate in Post-World War II United States,” Conference on International History, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, March 7-9, 2012.
•  “A ‘Constructive’ Immigration Policy: American Catholic Social Critics, Immigration Restriction, and the Living Wage, 1916-1929,” American Catholic Historical Association, American Historical Association Annual Meeting, Chicago, IL, January 5-8, 2012. (Panel Organizer.)
• “Ethnic Pluralism and Father Patrick Peyton’s Family Rosary Crusade in the United States, 1942-1960,” American Conference for Irish Studies, State College, PA. 5-8th May, 2010
• “Ethnic Pluralism and Father Patrick Peyton’s Family Rosary Crusade in the United States, 1942-1960,” Biennial Boston College Conference on the History of Religion, Chestnut Hill, MA. 19th-20th March, 2010.
• “‘The Secret of Ireland’: The Revival of Ethnic Identity and the Family Rosary Crusade in the United States, 1942-1960,” Irish Association for American Studies Postgraduate Symposium, University College Cork, Ireland. 16th January, 2010.
• "'Britain’s Last Colony’: Postcolonial Rhetoric and the Irish-American Movement for Civil Rights in Northern Ireland, 1967-1972," The Northeast Conference on British Studies, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, November 15, 2008.
• “John Mitchel and The Citizen: Mid-Nineteenth Century Irish Immigration and American Citizenship,” The New England Historical Association, Endicott College, Beverly, Massachusetts, October 25, 2008.